Inexperience and thrill-seeking a lethal mix on Fraser Island

IT was a beautiful April morning when James May got behind the wheel of a four-wheel-drive on Fraser Island earlier this year. The Liverpudlian, 20, and 10 fellow backpackers were crammed into a Toyota LandCruiser exploring the world’s largest sand island.”I was going about 65 to 70 kilometres an hour when this one particular wash [from the sea] came into my path,” said May, who had never driven on sand before. ”It was a split second [from when] I saw it and then we were in it. We went through the water and I remember the windscreen tilting and then we were rolling.”The vehicle rolled three times. A Briton, Ian Davy, 22, and an Italian, Concetta Dell-Angelo, 26, were killed. The rest were injured.The horrific accident sparked an overhaul of regulations governing four-wheel-driving on Fraser Island.But the death of a Japanese backpacker, Kenji Sakai, 25, in another four-wheel-drive accident on the World Heritage-listed Queensland island last weekend has raised questions about whether more needs to be done.There have been calls to limit beach driving to 50km/h and to introduce special four-wheel-drive licences for visitors. Police were breath-testing and drug-testing on the beach this week.Beach driving on Fraser Island is widely regarded as challenging. Drivers must contend with rising tides and wash-outs, and six months of little rain have made conditions even more difficult. Roof-racks laden with luggage make the vehicles top heavy and prone to rollovers when inexperienced drivers swerve to miss waves.In the past five years there have been 106 casualties on the island involving four-wheel-drives. More than 60 per cent involved overseas tourists, mainly backpackers in their 20s. Locals blame the dangerous combination of backpacker thrill-seeking and four-wheel-drive inexperience.”Most backpackers have never driven four-wheel-drives,” a Fraser Island conservationist, John Sinclair, said.The president of the Fraser Coast 4WD Operators Association, David Robertson, said the problem was their attitude. ”You’ve got to calm them down – they’re not going out to war, or to bush-bash.”Everyone who hires an association-accredited four-wheel-drive to tour Fraser Island must attend a one-hour safety briefing, which includes instructions on safe driving, island hazards, speed limits and current conditions.After the April accident, speed limits on the island were cut from 100km/h to 80km/h on the beach, and from 40km/h to 30km/h inland. Proper speed limit signs have been erected on the beaches. There has been increased policing of speed limits and more inspections of vehicles.From next year four-wheel-drives will be limited to carrying eight passengers and rooftop loads will be banned. Tag-along tours will be introduced, where backpackers can follow a lead four-wheel-drive.The Queensland Transport Minister, Rachel Nolan, said she would consider ”any further changes that need to be made”.But Mr Sinclair believes the island should stop marketing itself as a four-wheel-drive destination.